It might not have hit your radar just yet, but Call of Duty: Warzone has a new map. It seems to have come without much fuss, removing Verdansk from the game and replacing it with this endgame map pulled from Black Ops 7, and in the first few hours of it landing, it has produced a mixed reception (but mostly negative) from fans.
It’s called Avalon, and it’s an evolution over Blackout, the ‘original’ large-scale battle royale map launched with Black Ops 4 in 2018. The premise is great, but it has received a bit of blowback because it has awkward pacing and fewer players than some would like.
Avalon Doesn’t Land With Warzone Players
Firstly, it’s important to stress that all other modes in Warzone have been removed to make room for ‘Black Ops Royale’, which is the playlist name for Avalon. That’s strike one for the players who couldn’t care less about the new map.
In one comment on social media, a user noted that it felt like ‘REDSEC and Fortnite’ combined. There are no loadouts, and players must rely on what they can find to dominate the battlefield, which might be strike two.
Also, the player count has been slashed to just 100 users, but the map remains a fairly chunky size. That’s strike three.
One user had a damning statement about the mode:
Disappointment is an understatement, I was looking forward to this for a long time. It’s rough. Just got off after playing for over two hours and just uninstalled and decided to move on for good.
In terms of the rotations on Avalon, only quads can be played at present, which, believe it or not, is strike four.
There are a few positive comments to draw from regarding Avalon, though.
In one comment, someone wrote that the map is great, but the mode is not, while another said it’s fun but requested a solo queue for the mode.
The arrival of Avalon also didn’t herald much of a boost for the game in terms of viewership and players. On Twitch, the game went from peaks of around 33,000 to just 54,000 viewers, and on Steam (one of the only platforms for public numbers), the player count for Call of Duty in general saw no tangible increase compared to recent days.
Have you dropped into Avalon yet? Let us know what you think about the map on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
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Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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